Kewill warning on EU customs plan

Published Friday 28 May 2010 10:45 am

The European Union is stepping up border security with a new Import Control System (ICS) that will become mandatory from 1st January 2011.

And Kewill, the trade and logistics software specialist, reckons that it will be carriers of cargo that will be most affected by the change. In most cases, it says, they will be responsible for the correct electronic submission of the required data to the first port of entry to the EU.

ICS is aimed at providing advance visibility of shipments arriving within EU Customs territory and will require all traders importing goods to the EU to submit information electronically, in the form of an Entry Summary Declaration (ENS), prior to their arrival within the Community. This will be used to perform a near real-time risk analysis to inform Customs authorities on how to deal with individual shipments, reducing the risk of dangerous or suspicious shipments being admitted.

This represents a major change to the current process, where goods arriving from outside the European Union are declared to the local Customs authority at point of arrival in a summary declaration for cargo, often by manually giving the freight manifest to the local Customs office.

Evan Puzey, chief marketing officer at Kewill said: “ICS is the latest in a series of ongoing changes that will eventually lead to fully paperless customs globally. The risks and costs associated with ensuring compliance with ICS, along with other international regulations, can seem prohibitive for many businesses. However, using an integrated customs solution, such as Kewill CustomsXchange, to handle electronic customs declarations seamlessly via local solutions and domain experts, can significantly reduce the burden.”